This invention relates to a water purifier for use with bottle containers such as PET (polyethylen terephthalate) bottles as well as other plastic bottles, glass, ceramic, and metallic bottles.
In recent years, PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottles have been widely used as filling containers for carbonated drinks, mineral water, etc. It is suggested that PET bottles should be recycled in various ways due to their lightness in weight, durability and corrosion fatigue resistance.
As described in the official gazette of Japanese Patent Application Nos. 9-24365 and 11-77026, a PET bottle can be recycled as a water purifier by placing a filter in the filler port of the bottle. In this case, a cap wherein a filter medium is provided should be mounted in the filler port of the PET bottle. A water supply hole should be provided on the edge of the cap of the water purifier. When the PET bottle is slanted to pour the water into a glass or the like, the water inside the bottle will be purified through the filter medium.
When water runs through the aforementioned conventional water purifier for use with the bottle container, purified water does not come out easily from the water purifier since there is no air passage for allowing air into the bottle and air will possibly enter the bottle through the filler port. Especially if a large amount of water is poured from the PET bottle, the air bubble brought into the bottle will disturb the water stream, and eventually the water purification rate will decrease.
This inconvenience may be overcome by providing air holes on the bottom of the PET bottle. However, this is not recommended since processing PET bottles in such a way is complicated, and this may cause the PET bottle to have a water leakage.
In addition, the conventional water purifier for use with a bottle container has another inconvenience in that water cannot be filtrated at a stable rate which makes it difficult to improve the water purification and obtain good quality purified water.
Therefore, the present invention was made in the light of the above inconvenience, enabling the water purifier to be easily installed on bottle containers such as PET bottles or the like and purifying water efficiently. Also, this invention has a purpose to provide a water purifier for use with bottle containers, which can freely control the speed of the purification and provide highly-purified water.
To overcome the aforementioned inconveniences, a water purifier for use with bottle containers disclosed here is a water purifier which can be movably attached to the filler port of the bottle container and also can be readily removed, comprises a filter case; a filter medium fixed inside the said filter case; a joint part extending from the upper side of the said filter case and mounted in the filler port of the bottle container; and a vent tube extending from the outer surface of the bottle container to the wall surface of the joint part, also extending from the filler port to the inside of the bottle container.
When the water purifier as disclosed in this invention is fixed into the finer port of the bottle container and the bottle is turned upside down, the water inside the bottle comes down due to its own weight and runs through the filter medium. At this moment, the air entering the bottle through the vent tube will prevent air from entering the bottle through the filter port and the filter medium. Therefore, a stable volume of the water will be efficiently purified.
The following reasons are why a vent tube is installed through the wall around the joint of the water purifier for the bottle container.
1. If the vent tube is installed through the filter medium around the filler port, the purified water will drop down along the vent tube and this water will prevent the air stream toward the vent tube, which may destabilize the purifying speed.
2. If the vent tube is fixed from the filler port to the lower part of the joint on condition that the water purifier is fixed upon the water container, then the vent tube will contact the lower end of the water stands in the container which may stop the air.
3. If the vent tube is fixed through the filter medium, a watercourse may possibly be formed around the outer circumference of the vent tube and water may not go to the filter medium, then this will decrease the efficiency of the water purification.
According to the present invention of the water purifier for a bottle container, a system which can control air volume coming into the aforementioned bottle container will preferably be installed on the aforementioned vent tube, since the purifying performance of the filter medium can be adjusted by controlling the air volume of the vent tube, and also good quality purified water can be obtained by increasing the contacting time of the water and the filter medium.
Also, in this invention of the water purifier for a bottle container, an air chamber which can enlarge an air passage of the aforementioned vent tube will preferably be installed along the aforementioned vent tube.
If the air passage in the vent tube has a uniform diameter, water will flow backward by the water pressure in the bottle container. When a chamber is provided in the vent tube, air is temporarily pooled in the chamber before entering into the vent tube, and then the air is supplied into the bottle container. Pressure variation in the chamber is less than that in the air passage of the vent tube and inner pressure is almost evenly retained, thus the constant amount of air through the chamber will be evenly sent into the bottle container. Therefore, water does not easily flow backward because air is sent smoothly into the air passage which makes the amount of water purified stable and improves the purification.
In this invention with regard to the tabletop water purifier, it may be better to provide a funnel on the downstream of the foregoing filter in which the purified water is collected into the water supply hole and sent downward.
When a large amount of water is taken from the bottle container, air pressure in the bottle container is reduced which makes it easier to absorb external air into the bottle container from the downstream of the water purifier. If the aforementioned funnel is provided, water will be pooled in the water supply hole when water is purified, absorbing the external air into the bottle container is certainly prevented which makes the purified water flow more smoothly and the water purification operates more simply.